Opening with its title track, this EP jumps into 4/4 beats, gleaming synth tones, and harsh, electronically-processed vocals rasping out fairly goofy lyrics about dehumanization. The following songs, with martial/mechanical names like “A Show of Force” and “The Abyssal Machine”, follow similar formulations, with the vocals (which appear more often than not in a dreamy, almost Cure-like moan) receiving the widest degrees of variation. Though there’s good work put into the texturing, channel separation, and other production, the songs never really feel like much more than exercises in assembly, with little emotional or rhythmic pull to their loop arrangements (the dip into techno-metal with “The Abyssal Machine” being practically the only exception). Technically respectable, but unmemorable.
Scrambled Brains 